Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1887-01-07
THE SoUTH's ENTERPRISE,
Contrasting the Condition of the
Southern States in 1867
with the Present
Wonderful Progress in the De.
49, velopment Of Natural
Resources.
baltimore flianntchl

lately made an extensive trip through the
South. contributes to the Baltimore Mana-
facturers' Record of December 25 lengthy
article reviewing the progress of that Sec
ton, in which he presents some striking
now in progress there. Referring to his
visit to the South in 1867, Judge Kelley
says:
"The South was land of desolation,
her farms were fenceless and uncultivated,
and her people we're without reproductive
stock, or that with which to impel modern
agricultural implements had they been be-
slowed upon them gratuitously. They
were, practically speaking, without seed for
food or crops except what was bestowed
upon them by personal friends or the Gov
eminent, through the Freedmans, Bureau
and the agencies of the Agricultural De-
partment.
Contrasting this with what he saw on his
late trip, he says: @The progress in
wealth, in the means of individual COM
fort and productive power, has been mar
velous, and the change wrought from then
until now in the immense development Of,
coal and iron ore of these States, and the
increase in number and extent of industrial
centers, may justly be regarded as the work
of Titans. The systems of railroads that
now traverse the South are as per-
feet in the construction Of road-bed,
track, and bridges, and in passenger
cars and the means provided for the
North. Lateral roads branch from them
into such valleys as are known to be spe-
ally rich, not in iron alone. but in otner
minerals, some of which are found in such
profusion and juxtaposition as to seem TO
defy geologic laws as elsewhere illustrated.
"Prior to the war;" Judge Kelley writes,
"the South neither had nor desired to have
great cities. It is also true that her states
men preferred that their workshops should
be in foreign lands, and that the ships that
exported their products and brought them
commodities in exchange should be built
and owned by foreigners. In this respect
the contrast is most striking"
Nashville he found to be o beautiful city,
which surprised him by the extent and va
riety of its manufactures and the magnif-
cence of it's buildings. Chattanooga ard
Birmingham are each q marvel in its own
way. In the former he visited the great
industrial enterprises that are IN operation
there, and it was here that his attention
was first attracted to the neat, commodious,
and we'll painted homes of the negro labor
ers in mining, smelling, and mechanical
pursuits. The mechanical skill of the COL
ored laborer in some Of these enterprising
cities surprised him, and convinced him
that with IN industrial art school they
would soon produce gratifying evidence of
the adaptation Of negro labor to mechanical
pursuits requiring a high degree Of skill.
Referring to the proximity Of coal, iron
ore, and limestone at Birmingham, he says
it is not surprising that the oversanguine
men of that city really believe that they
will be able to make iron SO cheaply us to
soon close up the works of Pennsylvania
and force her iron masters and their en-
ployes to establish themselves ut Bir-
mingham. Ills, he states, has produced u
speculation in town lots that may ret,rd
the immediate growth of Birmingham,
termine the actual value of corner lots in
city whose success is TO extinguish
the furnace fires of Pittsburg, Brad
| docks, Johnstown, Bethlehem, and gener-
| ally throughout Penns, lvania. At Annis-
ton he spent ten days making thorough
investigation of the resources of the coun-
try tributary to that place. Here he found
| extensive IRON works, m lchine- shops, roN-
ing mills. carr works, and other industries,
besides large cotton mill, which ships q
! considerable part of it's product direct to
China. 5
The company which planned and built
nAAAStoAs OWlS OusVSV LCTc6 O1 1tiL(s III
| which are immense deposits of brown and
red hematite, fossiliferous, specular,
and magnetic, mountains Of lime
stone, and seemingly inexhaustible
supplies of wood and cooking and
gasooal They have just completed sixty
mile rnilroad, and will build another six
teen miles IN leng h, besides two furnaces
and other enterpr SEES. He predicts that
though Admission has never had "boom, :"
and though it's plating and development
have been managed SO quietly that its
name is hardly recognized by the popular
ear, it will, before two decades shall have
passed, be one of the most remarkable CEN
tiers Of iron, steel, and kindred industries
TO be found in those wonderfully endowed
States Georgia, Alabama, and Tennessee.
In closing he says: II have given but
faint limitations of the resources of the
mineral regions of the South, of the i'm
pulses that now animate her controlling
people. and of the rapid strides with which
the spirit of the nineteenth century is
changing not only the ASPECT of the coun-
try but the purposes and aspirations of the
| people of the'new South"
HORRIBLE CRIME OF MRS. DRusE.